Neo-colonialism

• Neocolonialism –’defined as the continuation of the economic model of colonialism after a colonized territory has achieved formal political independence.

F

1870’s

• Costa Rica= 1st to establish coffee production 1830 = by 1845 exporting to England

• Guatemala + El Salvador + Costa Rica by end of 19th century producing 14% of world supply

• Honduras + Nicaragua began later

IMPACT

- Land taken away from Church = sold off to Mestizo’s + foreign investors as coffee fincas (farms)

- Communal Lands- foreigners allowed to rent from indigenous people= not always paid

Legacies

• Started off in the 1880’s as small producers

• Railroads- companies planted along route + built for transporting bananas

• Early 1900’s small companies merging into UNITED FRUIT COMPANY

• 1910- North American companies owned 80% of banana crop + best land on Caribbean Coast

Impact

- Immigration of Afro Caribbean workers

- Labourers forced into debt and contract to UFC

- Monopolisation of land ownership by UFC

- Control of trade= import + exports

- Tax exemptions= eg. Honduras 1925- 0% import tax + 0% paid on profits

- Top managers + engineers imported from N.America or Europe- no training for locals

“The Companies also paid some taxes, on terms invariably favourable to them. And when they pulled out –because of a banana blight or a new corporate strategy –all what these multinational installations left behind was ex-banana choppers with no job, no land, no education, and a lot of missing fingers.” - Born in Blood & fire

The argument is that these foreign companies were to be accepted in contributing to the development of the Central American economy + infrastructure. Using this time period as a case study, would you support this argument? Explain and Discuss your opinion. Was the cost of ‘development’ worth it?